Gov. (Oyo) Ajimobi employs 20,000 youths

Posted by admin Headlines, Oyo, State News Friday, December 2nd, 2011

In fulfillment of the poverty alleviation programme of his administration, Governor Abiola Ajimobi of Oyo State, yesterday inaugurated the state Youth Empowerment Scheme, (YES-O) during which 20,000 youths were offered immediate employment.

The governor, while speaking during the inauguration at the Obafemi Awolowo Stadium where all the 20,000 youths were gathered, urged them to be apostles and agents of change.
At the programme, witnessed by eminent natives of the state, traditional rulers, top government officials and other stakeholders, Governor Ajimobi lamented the high rate of employment amongst the youth, saying the situation, if not addressed urgently, portended danger for the country.

“The statistics of unemployment in Nigeria is indeed alarming,’’ he said, adding that of Nigeria’s 150 million population, about 40 million were unemployed. Because 45 per cent of the Nigerian population is between the ages of 15 and 40 years, the implication is that this menace of unemployment critically affects the youth.
“The menace of unemployment poses great danger, not only to the Nigerian nation, but to the peace of this country at large. As it is said, if we don’t engage the youth, they will engage us,’’ Senator Ajimobi said.

He described unemployment as a virus, which had eaten deep into the social fabrics of the nation, saying that it had caused social disquiet from the governed to the government and had the propensity to cause a revolt.
According to the governor, unemployment is the harbinger of the spate of crime, kidnapping, perennial youth unrest and the acutely unstable socio-economic structure that had bedevilled Nigeria.
“If we at the helm of affairs must continue to administer the country without any disequilibrium, an end must be made to come to the problem of unemployment in the country,’’ he said.
Governor Ajimobi noted that before now, many administrations had developed a couple of ways of tackling the rising unemployment decimal in the country.

“For some administrations, gathering a few hundreds of pepper-grinding machines and bicycles to the army of unemployed youth was the appropriate response to this menace.
“But experiences have shown that these efforts eventually entered into the vortex of hopelessness as they soon became enmeshed in political patronage dispensation.
“Indeed, such efforts soon became a hub of corruption, leaving the recipients of this governmental intervention worse than they were before government’s intervention,’’ he said, adding that only a system that gave dignity and voice to the unemployed could succeed in wiping away their tears.

He said the YES-O scheme was projected to give the employed a sense of belonging, acting as a resource base for the state in other areas of need.
The governor said right from its inception, his administration was aware that, for it to effectively affect the lives of a great number of its population of which the youth was key, it must tackle the monster of unemployment headlong.
“This was why, at the outset of this administration, we made it clear that provision of job for our teeming unemployed youths is primary in the list of our ‘firsts.’
He said the YES-O scheme was just a minute spectrum of his administration’s youth empowerment scheme, stressing “we intend to engage the youths in productive ventures that would take them away from crime and other destructive ventures.

“We do not want youths to be seen as a curse to our children but one to be relished and savoured,’’ Ajimobi said.
He said the scheme would serve as an avenue for the provision of jobs and training of the youths in cognitive and entrepreneurial skills that would in turn make them productive agents of change in the state’s economy.
He assured that his government would continue to put the fate and future of the youths in the state at the front-burner of all its activities.
“It is unacceptable to us that year in year out, our children are churned out of higher institutions and they end up becoming social liabilities to us and our society.

-Sunwp_posts